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Author Archives: Sabrina I. Pacifici

New Axios/Ipsos American Health Index

“As a summer COVID surge continues, the latest Axios/Ipsos American Health Index finds that concern about COVID is ticking up, even as mask use hasn’t changed. However, concern about COVID remains relatively low and in line with other respiratory illnesses, like the flu. When it comes to the top public health worries for the country,… Continue Reading

Americans’ Views on Book Restrictions in U.S. Public Schools 2024

“A study from the Knight Free Expression Research Series produced by Knight Foundation in partnership with Langer Research Associates. Book challenges and restrictions in U.S. public schools have increased dramatically since 2021. Yet research on public awareness, attitudes and engagement in these activities is limited. In an effort to fill this critical knowledge gap in… Continue Reading

Recovering locked Facebook accounts is a nightmare. That’s on purpose.

Washington Post: “…A quick Google search for “locked social media account” suggests plenty of people have already learned the hard way. Reddit threads, advice columns and emails to The Washington Post’s Help Desk show social media users are plagued by lost and hacked accounts and often driven to despair. Account recovery processes are frustrating and… Continue Reading

Don’t trust Google for customer service numbers. It might be a scam.

Washington Post [unpaywalled]: “Scams just keep popping up when you Google. On Monday, I found what appeared to be impostors of customer service for Delta and Coinbase, the cryptocurrency company, in the “People also ask” section high up in Google. A group of people experienced in Google’s intricacies also said this week that it took… Continue Reading

Multinational Enterprise Information Platform

Annie Burns-Pieper] via Data is Plural: “The Multinational Enterprise Information Platform, a collaboration between the OECD and the UN Statistics Division, provides publicly sourced data on the 500 multinational corporations with the largest market capitalization. Its “Global Register” dataset examines the companies’ structure, listing each subsidiary’s name, parent company, address, alternative names, and various unique… Continue Reading

Is Your SSN in the National Public Data Breach? Here’s How to Find Out

PC Mag: “Two cybersecurity firms launch separate websites that can tell you if your personal information, including Social Security number, was exposed in the National Public Data breach. A massive data breach has Americans worried about their private info getting into the wrong hands, but a pair of newly released websites could make it easier… Continue Reading

Deloitte survey reveals enterprise generative AI production deployment challenges

VentureBeat: “A new report from Deloitte sheds light on the complex landscape of generative AI adoption in the enterprise, revealing both significant progress and persistent challenges. The survey, titled “The State of Generative AI in the Enterprise: Now decides next,” gathered insights from 2,770 business and technology leaders across 14 countries and six industries. The… Continue Reading

Even laypeople use legalese

Even laypeople use legalese Eric Martínez, Francis Mollica and Edward Gibson – MIT. Published August 19, 2024. PNAS 121 (35). “Why are laws so complicated? Across two preregistered experiments, we found that people tasked with writing official laws wrote in a more convoluted manner than when tasked with writing unofficial legal texts of equivalent conceptual… Continue Reading

How Switching Behavior on Digital Media Makes People More Bored

“Fast-forward to boredom: How switching behavior on digital media makes people more bored,” Katy Y. Y. Tam, PhD, and Michael Inzlicht, PhD, University of Toronto, Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, published online Aug. 19, 2024. “Boredom is unpleasant, with people going to great lengths to avoid it. One way to escape boredom and increase stimulation is to consume digital… Continue Reading

Rejecting Dogmas Around AI, User Privacy, and Tech Policy

Via LLRX – Rejecting Dogmas Around AI, User Privacy, and Tech Policy – The Markup’s Ross Teixeira had a virtual discussion with Jonathan Frankle, Chief Scientist at DataBricks, about the the ethics of companies using customer data to train models, the growing trend of integrating AI models into our personal devices and lives, and how people can… Continue Reading